I am trying to translate this phrase into Kanji for a tattoo. It was tattooed on a characters forehead in one of my favorite books.

So far I have:貧 :hin: poor

貧弱な: hinjakuna: poor, meager, limited

I could not find just the word impulse but I liked this one:出来心: dekigokoro: sudden impulse

And for control I found拝見 : haiken : verification, control

Its the control part I'm not sure of. There are other symbols for control (for instance 管理), and I'm not sure which would be best in this context. Also how accurate is 貧 for poor. I think 貧弱な would be closer in meaning for what I want, but I want it easily tattooed as well so the fewer symbols the better.

Ideally I want either 3 symbols or a 3x3 block. The 3x3 would be less open to interpritation, but less painful and expensive also.

Snow Crash. You just don't get a better protagonist than a Katana wielding pizza delivery boy for the mafia driving a heavily customized off road truck with armor plating. Your pizza is delivered in 30 mins or the Mafioso and family will come to your door and apologize in person. And then have the errant delivery boy "dealt with"

Dmitri "Raven" RavinoffAn Aleut native who works as a mercenary. His preferred weapons are harpoons, spears, and glass knives — undetectable by metal-searching security systems, reputed to be molecule-thin at the edges and able to penetrate the bulletproof windbreakers which most characters in Snow Crash rely on for protection. He travels on a motorcycle whose sidecar has been replaced with a hydrogen bomb that will automatically detonate if his brain ceases to emit electrical impulses. Raven has the phrase "POOR IMPULSE CONTROL" tattooed on his forehead, an indication that he has been arrested for committing a violent crime at least once in his life. His stated goal in life is to "nuke America" in retaliation for the historical treatment by America of native Aleutians, such as using their lands for nuclear testing (e.g., at Amchitka). His combination of fighting ability, conscienceless killing, and personal nuclear umbrella prompt Stephenson to describe Raven as "the baddest motherf***r in the world".

Harisenbon wrote:Although I'm highly against the tattooing of kanji that you can't read on yourself, I do own snow crash in Japanese, and can go look up what "poor impulse control" was officially translated into.

I don't remember it having the same impact as the english version, though.

I'd be very interested to see what translation they chose as well. Please do post it!